When Major-General Colvile saw that the Boers had thus arrested the march of the Scots Guards, he determined to employ his reserve, the 1st Coldstream, in prolonging the line of the brigade to the right so as to extend beyond the enemy's left. The 1st Coldstream was then on the right rear of the leading battalions and was formed in two lines, one behind the other, each in echelon of companies from the left. Lt.-Colonel Codrington, who commanded it, accordingly moved to the right, where he was unexpectedly stopped by the Riet, of the existence of which he was unaware. Major Granville Smith's company, which was one of those that first reached the river, was ordered to line part of the left bank, to repel an expected attack in flank from burghers who had been seen on the plain beyond the further bank. In this part of its winding course the right of the Riet is higher than the left, so that Major Granville Smith's field of view was very limited. He therefore sought for a ford by which he could reach the dominant bank. Finding traces of a disused drift, he waded alone over a narrow spit of rock through water which reached to his chin, to the right side of the river, where he was soon joined by Lt.-Colonel Codrington with two other officers and 18 non-commissioned officers and men. After driving away some Boers by musketry, the little party reconnoitred up and down the stream in the vain hope of finding a more practicable ford, and was then ordered by a staff officer to recross and return. During the time employed in this unsuccessful quest the greater part of Colonel Codrington's battalion had pushed down the river, some companies in the bed, others along the bank. As they scrambled on, fording was attempted at many points, but in every case the deep water, and the almost equally deep mud at the bottom of the stream, proved impassable. The leading company reached the angle of the bend where the Riet breaks away to the westward, but there, shot down by invisible Boers, some hidden along the right bank, others holding a farm and garden on the left bank, they could get forward no further. A patrol worked down stream sufficiently far to the west of the bend to be able to see the railway bridge, but was driven back by musketry. The battalion took up a position along the left bank, entrenching itself with the Slade-Wallace tools, carried as part of the soldiers' equipment. Some companies faced to the west, the remainder to the north and east. Here they remained till nightfall. They were a target for the defenders of the banks of the Riet, for a detachment which lined the Modder near the northern reservoir, and for a pom-pom. This latter was, however, quickly driven away by a few well-aimed section volleys. Some time after 9 a.m. two companies of Scots Guards, by order of Major-General Colvile, fell back from where they were on the plain, and forming up along the river bank prolonged the line of the 1st Coldstream to the south-west.